First off, I don't intend for this to be a bash others faith/beliefs thread; I want serious and honest replies without discrimination.

Whether or not you believe in an after-life, i.e. salvation, can you honestly say that you don't have the slightest doubt about it? Correct me if I'm wrong about these observations, here are a couple of examples of the different beliefs about salvation.

1. Buddhists
-By self-effort only

2. Christian Scientists
-Christ's shed blood on the cross did not cleanse humanity from sin.
-His disciples were fooled into thinking He was dead when He was really alive in the tomb
(see Science and Health 330, 349).

3. Hindus
-Humanity is justified through devotion, meditation, good works, and self-control.

4. Jehovah's Witnesses
-Christ's death provides the opportunity for people to work for their salvation: perfect human life for eternity on an Eden-like earth.

5. Mormons
-Salvation comes by works. All people will spend eternity on some level of a multistory heaven. The level will be determined by the scope of each person's good works.

6. Muslims
-Humanity earns its own salvation, and pays for its own sins.

7. Unitarians
-People are essentially good and can be saved by "redemption of character."

8. Atheists, Agnostics, Pagans
-No salvation (?)

9. Satanists
-?

10. Other
-?

Christianity
[1] Through Christ's efforts only.
[2] Christ's shed blood atoned for humanity's sins. Christ died and rose from the dead in bodily form.
[3] Humanity is justified through the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus Christ Who died in our stead.
[4] Christ's death was the complete payment for humanity's sins.
[5] Salvation is a free gift provided by the grace (unmerited love) of God for all who believe and accept His plan.
[6] Christ, God's Son, died for our sins, (on the cross) not Judas, according to the inspired Word of God.
[7] Humanity is inherently sinful. There is only one way that humanity can rid itself of its sinful nature: through faith by the grace (unmerited love) of God.
[8] ?
[9] ?
[10] ?

My point here is that Christianity seems to preach a narrow-minded message, "There is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Jesus Christ. All roads don't lead to God. All religions are not good. There is only one road that leads to God and that is Jesus Christ. He said, 'I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.'"

Yeah it sounds bigoted, however when a Christian has these beliefs they are referring to hope of an after-life. But not the way we tend to use the word hope. It refers to something that is certain.

Today I have the hope of eternal life, through Jesus Christ. He died in order that I might experience the life of God. God imparts His eternal life to me; and as He imparts that life to me; I have the hope and the certainty for the future. I'm going to spend eternity in the kingdom of God. Do you have this hope?

5. Mormons
-Salvation comes by works. All people will spend eternity on some level of a multistory heaven. The level will be determined by the scope of each person's good works.


This is wrong. Salvation is by grace, exaltation (your standing in heaven) is based on works.

Narrow-minded sounds... negative. We are called to believe in only one God, and only one way... but that's certainty, not narrow-mindedness.

well, not from a christian perspective anyway. but i can see how some non-beleivers would see it that way. one god. one way. everything else is wrong. you have no hope without giving ur life/heart to christ. it could seem narrow minded. i know different though. i didn't find jesus. i believe he found me. and probably had to dig me so far out of hell, that his hand was burned, if it could, when he pulled me out. i was hell bound, but now am saved. i know where i'm going after this life. i can only hope and pray that more people will come to that realization, before it's eternally too late. i don't know if hell is real or not. but i know i'd rather not find out the "hot" way.

Christians are narrow-minded to people who believe other "things" or apart of another religion. Not that it is bad or anything I think everyone is narrow-minded, if you got an opinion that is different from someone else or whatever your narrow-minded. It might even be a good thing just as long as you don't trash people with difference of opinion with your wrong I'm right talk.

So really it can be good and can be bad depending on how the term is used. Narrow-minded could mean someone who focuses on one thing or path in there life or it could mean your a selfish arrogant person who thinks everyone is wrong but you.

Similar can be said about being open-minded, however when I look at being open-minded I believe in order to be completely open-minded you must not follow religion or one path in general. You can still be Christian and open-minded however the definition of that changes slightly and you POV decreases due to the path you have chosen.

Open minded person: God could exist
Narrow minded person: God exists

So when a path is chosen you become narrow-minded

Yes they can be very narrow minded i know for a fact!,but like all things it depends on who you talk to. for example..My stepdad is a preacher,but still very open minded he likes metal gear and other military games when i talk with him about religion he listens and corrects my mistakes.My mom on the other hand is very narrow minded if you try to tell her anything about religion that isnt strait from the bible my "the mana machine"thread for example.If i would have told her about that she would have got very angry and yelled at me.and say that shes gonna pray for me and stuff.so of course they "can"be but as a whole i dont think so.Catholics on the other hand..........just kidding!lol!

geeogree : Mormonism teaches that the Celestial Kingdom is made up of three levels or degrees of heaven. Also, that we are saved by the grace of God. However, salvation is not free. For example, if one chooses to not live the commandments that God has given, then how can he be worthy to live in the presence of God?

And that, Jesus Christ paid the price for our sins, but we must do out part to accept His atonement and live His commandments. Accepting His atonement is not enough. Through the grace of Jesus we can be redeemed from our sins and return to the presence of our Heavenly Father clean from all sin, again if we keep His commandments the best we know how. "...for we know that it is by grace that we are saved, after all that we can do" (2 Nephi 7:2 2 Nephi 25:23).

I would agree that salvation was not free for God, for whom it cost Him everything. But it is a free gift for us. He wants us to come to Him with empty hands and the realization that we do not deserve and cannot earn the gift of eternal life that comes only through trusting in Jesus.

This way of salvation through Mormon faith would seem to be stressful on the person to obtain. What I'm saying is you can be at peace with God by trysting solely in the righteousness of Christ.

Obedience for the person who has put his trust in Christ is a matter of bearing fruit and walking out the new kind of life (new heart, new motivation, new source of power) that Christ brings at the point of salvation. Obedience for the person who has NOT put his trust in Christ, but is trusting in himself to earn heaven on his own merit, counts for nothing because Jesus said, "Apart from Me, no one comes to the Father" (John 14:6).

Not really, in a sense I would say we have a bigger mind than most other people because we don't just go by what we see but what we don't see.

Well, non-Christians are going to think that Christianity is very narrow-minded...I mean, I admit, it sure looks that way...Jesus being THE way, THE truth...God saying that there is no other god than God Himself.

But when a person is looking around for these religions and worldviews, it is like someone trying to offer a choice of 4 gifts: The Original Mona Lisa, the keys to a new Lamborghini, a million dollars, or a parachute. And it seems that people will choose any of those gifts except the parachute. However, if someone gives the situation that the person is in....which is the person needs to jump ten thousand feet from the ground....the person would automatically choose the parachute, because now it becomes a matter of the person NEEDING the parachute. And what the Christian message is saying is that everyone NEEDS Christ because of the sin that they have committed in their life, that it is the only solution that your sins would be forgiven, and that nothing else is more important than your eternal salvation.

"For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what shall a man give in return for his soul?" (Matthew 16:26)

Satanists that believe in devil worship have varied ideas on afterlife. The other side of Satanism, which is just worshipping yourself, may as well have the afterlife be a good remake of a zombie horror movie, but probably is just like an atheist's views.

That aside, depends on the Christian. Both of my parents are narrow minded, but I am not. I even plan to get holy books of other religions when I move out, since my mom is so scared to just because she doesn't want anyone to think anything. Oh no. The word Satan! It must mean that guy we think lives in Hell, but doesn't. Oh no! Quaran. The person might have weapons!

*facepalm* Oh how I wish my mom would listen. I want the books for information. Besides, even if the store owner rose an eyebrow, does it truly matter when you never know if they will see you again?

KlawedFlaw : Hey you said, "I even plan to get holy books of other religions when I move out"

You can actually (literally) look them up over the net, which I've mostly done, and find out that way . It's good I think to have knowledge of the others to compare or contrast, though, for me, the others don't persuade me away from the faith I already have because the Christian faith is the most logical out of the rest because I don't have to earn it .

tRIUNE : I would, but I don't like printing stuff out. I might have to do that.

I still don't think that Christians are narrow minded, but I think that not believing in something just because you can't see it and touch it is narrow minded.

There are narrow-minded people regardless of religion (or lack thereof). To answer your question, I would say that yes and no. There are Christians who honestly believe that they're right and everyone else is wrong. That is narrow-minded. No one is sure of what happens or if anything does happen after death. All of the theories sound pretty silly in my opinion. But, I am respectful to what people believe in. I saw a documentary on the tele and these scientists (I assume) were testing this one part of the human brain. It was supposed to be linked to God. By that I mean, when it is stimulated, it can cause people to feel as if there is a presence around them. They tested it out on this young woman, and she did feel like there were other beings around her. They came up with a hypothesis that this is where the idea of a greater presence (or God) originally came from; literally from inside us (I guess the Buddhists came close). Many of the stories in the Bible were actually adaptations of earlier tales in older religions too.

The most narrow-minded thing that I have ever heard was that the world is 6,000 years old. That is the falsest thing that I have ever heard. We have fossils from millions of years ago. Heck, we have ancestors of us from earlier than that. There is so much proof with carbon dating, ice cores, rocks, etc. I still can't believe that people overlook this obvious underestimation. Nowhere in the Bible does it say 6,000 anyway; I believe that a bishop came up with this number 1,200 or so years ago.

However, I am a Christian I'd say and I am open to new ideas, scientifically researched conclusions, etc. So calling all Christians narrow-minded is narrow-minded, however, the ones who are extremely devout and restrict themselves only to binary thinking, strongly tend to be narrow-minded.

the age of the earth is based on a lot of unverifiable assumptions about the way processes occur in nature.

You don't know what the half-life of carbon was 500 years ago, or 5,000 years ago. It might be exactly the same, it might not be.

I'm not claiming to be a young-earth creationist.... just pointing that out.

I wouldn't just call them "assumptions." A lot of work, study, and research was done on the subject. And everything that's been scientifically published is scrutinized very heavily that to even not get laughed off, scientists need to provide plenty of proof as well as many tests. Nothing is set in stone, but, this is as close as you can get (for now at least).

You don't even need to know the half-life of carbon was back then or even know what half-life means. Every year, snow accumulates at the poles, and every year, a new layer is added. If you excavate deep enough, you will see many layers. If you count the layers, you will know how many years back you are going in time. I think 20 meters is one of the bigger size steel rods that the scientists have when they get ice cores. The ice taken with this size, goes back at least 100,000 years I believe.

Look at this graph:



We wouldn't be able to have such information if it weren't for the ice sheets.

I think that it's safe to assume that such things would be impossible if the planet were only 6,000 years old. I mean, you can go to the Arctic and see for yourself. It's pretty simple, each Winter adds a new layer. You count the layers. And voila, there are at least more than 6,000.

some of them are assumptions.... not all of them.

I'm not arguing in favor of a young earth. I don't believe it. That was just 1 argument from that side that I've heard before.

Most of science is based on assumptions that certain things happen a certain way for a REALLY long time. But we don't know for sure that those assumptions hold true, we simply assume they do because there is no evidence to say otherwise.

And to say the science is set in stone is arrogant. There have been plenty of theories and ideas that people thought were set in stone that have changed or been thrown out completely. We may look back in 100 years and be baffled at how primitive humans are right now. We do that already about people who lived at the beginning of the 20th century. Most didn't have electricity or cars, or anything else we're used to having now.

I don't think anyone is saying that it is exactly 6000 years old, but I do believe in a young earth. There are just too many assumptions from the evidences that was given (carbon dating, for example: mathematically, it would work tremendously, but there are at least 3 variables that are assumptions, and a small margin of error in the assumptions would be a huge error in the final answer just because it is a natural logarithm.) As a science major, I know that theories, research, findings would come and go or adjust as time goes on (Like Newton's model of gravity is changed from Einstein's model of gravity with the addition of relativity), but we do know "...the word of the Lord remains forever.” (1 Peter 1:25)

I think what we should be asking is what topics can we be narrow-minded about. Because no doubt, there are things that we cannot be open-minded about, but there may be secondary issues that can be open. That being said, we really cannot be open-minded for some of the key issues. You can't really call yourself a Christian if you are not really believing what a Christian believes? Part of the claim is that Christians would know where they go if they die when they repent and put their trust in the savior and those who do not.

You misunderstood me, I clearly stated that "nothing is set in stone." That holds even more truth with science. New things are learned and debated all the time. However, at this point in time, there's a general consensus among people in science that the Earth is over 4 billion years old (or at least not as young as 6,000). And I think you underestimate us.

And this was just one example. You don't have to agree with this, but, at least be open to the idea that just because you think that something is true, that does not mean that it can't be up for scrutiny.

You can be a Christian and not believe in a young Earth. Like I said, the age long believed to be 6,000 years was an estimation over a millennium ago. Back then, science and religion were not as separate as they are today. It's possible that with a better understanding of the universe around them, that number would have been different.

Religion adapts. There's so many different little cliques almost in every faith. Your beliefs may be slightly different from the church in the next town, but, you are all Christians. I don't believe that anyone knows where they go when they die. If anything, God would have final judgment on that. Why can't all religions just be a path to God? Everyone has the same intentions.

I am open for anything. Anything can happen.

I don't believe in a young Earth. For one, I can't imagine God making natural structures like the Grand Canyon in a day. It just makes no sense, and God didn't leave dinosaur fossils to trick us, after all. Also, why would God bother making all these natural degradation if it could be done so fast?

I also believe in evolution. Not the MONKEYS LOL! kind, but the actual theory. Did God make DNA and ancestors for the lulz? Doubt it. Think about this if you're about to say I'm being misled, how can it be possible for a opossum to be genetically related to the Saber Toothed Tiger? This is not a lie. They are related to the Saber Toothed Tigers. Was God just wanting to laugh at how funny that idea was?

I mean, God has a sense of humor, and find twisted things like making big bad butt creature into wimps funny possibly, but how can all the evidence found be for nothing? The Bible says nothing about what animals God made aside from the fact that there was fish, birds, man, and beast. That's all. I don't believe we can even be sure how long 7 days was when God made everything. Our idea of time is manmade, so we will obviously use it. What if time before everything was finished wasn't 24 hours? What if it was actually years due to the creation still being under way?

There's even some theories that the 24 hour day thing could be proven wrong. I've only read one theory, but we never know. Our world is one that is truly the unknown no matter how much we find out. Every discovery leads to more questions.